Posted
I knew about the Muggeridge thing and the film. And I've also met people who went to Calcutta, brim-full of enthusiasm, to work for Mother Teresa and who returned to the UK disillusioned or, in the case of 1, very angry - so angry in fact that he wrote to the Vatican at the time when her sanctification was first mooted to point out that she wasn't doing anymore than warehouse people and let them die unnecessarily. Needless to say they received a letter from the Holy City that was full of flannel and said precisely nothing.

Posted
I used to volunteer at a home they ran in the Yemen. And also visited the leper colony they had there. This was in the late eighties and early nineties. At that point they were providing a worthwhile service, in the context of a third world country with no universal health care.

They didn't try to convert those they cared for to Christianity, which meant they were allowed to operate in various Islamic countries where many other agencies were not accepted.

I think you have to look at what they provided in the context of what the available alternatives were. A quarter of a century ago in Yemen, woman were still dying regualrly in childbirth - having had a child every year or two of their marriage. Most people were subsistence farmers, and were screwed if the crop failed. The tap water was not drinkable and there were cholrea epidemics. It was usual, if you were physically disabled, that you would spend your life begging on the streets if you had no family to support you. We met people in remote villiages who were shackled by their families to keep them from wandering.

When we travelled in some areas people would crowded around asking for medicine, because we were white foreigners, wanting usually antibiotics and paracetamol.

Sometimes they would insist on you meeting someone who was sick in the hope you'd be able to help. They could be more than 8 hours from the nearest doctor. Even the oil companies were running health clinics to try to improve basic healthcare.

Eight nuns and a few helpers ran a home for, it must have been, over 50 people. There were about 20 children with multiple disabilities, adults with severe developmental and mental health problems and they survived on donations.

The standard of care was poor compared to what you would have had in the UK at that time, but considerably better than what would have happened to these people without them.

[ 20. December 2015, 08:46: Message edited by: Doublethink. ]

--------------------All political thinking for years past has been vitiated in the same way. People can foresee the future only when it coincides with their own wishes, and the most grossly obvious facts can be ignored when they are unwelcome. George OrwellPosts: 19219 | From: Erehwon | Registered: Aug 2005
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Posted
(Yes, she was a conservative Roman Catholic, hence the antiI-contraception stance and the talk about the beauty of Christ like suffering. I think complaining about that is on a par with complaining the Pope's Catholic.)

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Posted
I suppose the real issue is the nature of official sainthood. I have BIG problems with it as a concept, because it does raise some individuals over most others, and tends to gloss over the problems in their life.

Mother Theresa has done some good things in her life, I think. She has also done some bad things, and holds views that are not currently considered appropriate. That is largely because she is a conservative Catholic, and those positions are not really the generally acceptable position.

In all of that, she is just like any other saint in the Catholic lexicon. Which is why I tend to struggle with the concept of sainthood. She was not any better than anyone else. She may have had different opportunities and made use of the chances she has had.

I think that is the problem with sainthood - it isn't about saying "well done" for the good things, and "Don't be a dick" for the bad things, it is about pretending that their whole life is worthy of celebration. Nobody's life is worthy of celebration as a whole. The good doesn't outweigh the bad. The good that everyone does should be celebrated, and the bad condemned.

As it is, the sainthood process distorts the perception of a persons life. And because this is then held up as a model for others, it becomes an impossible aim, because even the saint couldn't live up to this standard.

When we were in Yemen, they used cloth to tie some of the children into their cots at night - at the ankle or wrist. And there was one child with a cage over the top of his cot.

There was no supervision in the dormitory at night. The lad had microcephaly and would climb out of his bed. He would hurt the other children - not intentially but through lack of understanding - by trying to pick them up by one limb etc.

If you were setting up a home in the UK, even then, you would have far less children. They'd have proper bedrooms. You would have waking night staff etc

But they didn't have those options.

Reading that article I do wonder where the money went, but the staffing makes logical sense.

If you have 5400 staff, some of whom will be unable to work and 600 facilities of various sizes. Then you won't have many nuns per facility.

The home we went into did have access to physio, but not much - so I don't think getting in outside professional help is an entirely new thing.

I've no doubt the organisation wasn't perfect, nothing is, but I do also feel there is a lack of recognition, by some commentators, of the cultural context.

In essence its a form of rationed care - the mission takes some people getting no care and provides basic care. It would always be possible to provide more for one specific individual, but then the number of people to whom you can provide basic care to overall reduces. The argument is what constitutes basic care, and how much resource they actually did/do have.

I suspect the funding income is over stated.

--------------------All political thinking for years past has been vitiated in the same way. People can foresee the future only when it coincides with their own wishes, and the most grossly obvious facts can be ignored when they are unwelcome. George OrwellPosts: 19219 | From: Erehwon | Registered: Aug 2005
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Posted
Mother T to be a saint! Who knew such a thing would happen? Yeah, I know the West mostly didn't care for her, but the Holy See has given up the West to paganism and atheism. In India, she is almost a saint to Indian Catholics and that is where the impetus is coming from.

After all, the late Princess of Wales held her hand, and made several visits to this fund-raising little nun. If Diana, patron saint to elderly British women, liked her, what could possibly be wrong with her?

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Posted
I'd scarcely rely upon Hitchens as a reliable authority in this area.

AIUI, 2 miracles are necessary as a part of getting onto the Roman canon. Those which come readily to mind, and are easily verifiable, are bringing Malcolm Muggeridge back to his faith, and then having a similar effect on Princess Diana.

Posted
Yeah Doublethink, I've been naïve. Again. There is NO Christian leadership, there are NO Christian heroes. There is the long arc. The remainder of this century will see an ever sharper dip as the existential crisis of Islam resolves for the following 9. Or 99.

quote:Originally posted by Gee D: I'd scarcely rely upon Hitchens as a reliable authority in this area.

There was a study done by a past editor of the Lancet which was fairly critical of the both the quality of care and the level of medical knowledge that meant that they often didn't distinguish between those who were easy to treat vs those who were dying, leading to unnecessary pain and death.

There are also plenty of non-religious Indian critiques of the conduct of the house at Calcutta.
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quote:Originally posted by Gee D: 2 miracles are necessary as a part of getting onto the Roman canon. Those which come readily to mind, and are easily verifiable, are bringing Malcolm Muggeridge back to his faith, and then having a similar effect on Princess Diana.

You are becoming increasingly obscure once more. You appear to this reader to be in favour of this sanctification, but it's difficult to be certain of your message as I attempt to decipher your obfuscation.
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Suspending my disbelief for a minute, if my loved one was seriously ill would I entrust his/her cause to just one "unconfirmed" saint?

Or perhaps more likely I would also enlist a "tried and tested" saint - or even the doctors - in my anxiety to see the person cured?

Then if the person was cured how would I know whether the "unconfirmed" saint was the key intervention and not that of the "old hand" saint (or even some overworked, underpaid and totally unthanked hospital doctor)?

Possibly in my keenness to get my name in print as the champion of the "unconfirmed" saint leading to his/her confirmation I might possibly be tempted to overstate his/her intervention and not mention the more mundane saint/medics?

quote:I think you have to look at what they provided in the context of what the available alternatives were.

there's the nub. So often it is very easy to come from a Western mind set of what is acceptable medical practice and care but little attention is paid to the general normal practice of the place. In Mother Teresa's case I always understood that a significant part of her work was among the 'untouchables' in India and certainly during the 80's such people received no care at all, let alone medical attention.

She was clever in her dealings though; perhaps too clever to now be a saint, of that's possible. She was criticised in her lifetime quite directly about taking money from the hand of corruption but her retort was that she knew it was from the hand of evil but she turned it to good. I'm never really sure how I feel about this. It strikes me that there is a kind of resignation in this about how the world works, but I'm not sure that if I were in her shoes I could do it without keeping my mouth shut about other things which would likely end with a bullet to the head.

Posted
The trouble, Toadstrike, is that Christopher Hitchens was such an opinionated ranter, that he's no authority for anything, whether fact or opinion.

Is there any independent source that a person might respect that argues the same?

quote:Originally posted by fletcher christian: ... She was clever in her dealings though; perhaps too clever to now be a saint, of that's possible. She was criticised in her lifetime quite directly about taking money from the hand of corruption but her retort was that she knew it was from the hand of evil but she turned it to good. I'm never really sure how I feel about this. It strikes me that there is a kind of resignation in this about how the world works, but I'm not sure that if I were in her shoes I could do it without keeping my mouth shut about other things which would likely end with a bullet to the head.

I can sort of see that in the abstract ideological way, but I'd also query whether that's to fail to appreciate what Incarnation is about.

Posted
I think the whole sainthood business is ridiculous, but then I'm such a dyed-in-the-wool old Protestant I WOULD think that, wouldn't I?

If you lay aside the sainthood aspect, it seems to me Teresa was much like most people of faith -- she did and said some good things and some bad things. It's the rush to make the good things seem flawless and perfect that makes the bad things so troubling. You'd be hard-pressed to find any person who did a lot of good in his/her life, religious or secular, who didn't also eff up a fair bit. The brighter their good deeds shine, the more harsh light is also brought to bear on their flaws.

I've read Mary Johnson's memoir "An Unquenchable Thirst," about her time as a nun with the Missionaries of Charity, which provides a complex and nuanced view of Teresa's work. I think there were obviously a lot of things she could have done better, but I cynically note how many of the criticisms of Teresa and her work come out of the mouths of people who would probably cut off their own hand before they'd wash the open sores of a dying homeless person. So I'm not sure all of us who have lived more comfortable, sanitary lives have earned the right to criticize all the things she DIDN'T get right. (Those who have done that kind of work themselves have, of course, much more right to be critical and to point out how it could be done better).

quote:Originally posted by Gee D: I'd scarcely rely upon Hitchens as a reliable authority in this area.

There was a study done by a past editor of the Lancet which was fairly critical of the both the quality of care and the level of medical knowledge that meant that they often didn't distinguish between those who were easy to treat vs those who were dying, leading to unnecessary pain and death.

There are also plenty of non-religious Indian critiques of the conduct of the house at Calcutta.

Yes, but then these weren't medical staff.

The broader question might be - if you were a doctor, and one of these homes was within your catchment area, why weren't you providing medical care to these people and referring them to a hospital if required ?

And in the lack of a meaningful answer to that question lies the void that these missions try to fill.

--------------------All political thinking for years past has been vitiated in the same way. People can foresee the future only when it coincides with their own wishes, and the most grossly obvious facts can be ignored when they are unwelcome. George OrwellPosts: 19219 | From: Erehwon | Registered: Aug 2005
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Posted
I'm not opposed to sainthood but I think it is quite difficult to canonise people from the 20th century or later because the minutiae of people's lives are known more, including their inner thoughts. So you get the position of people being proposed for sainthood who would not necessarily have wanted it, and who we can perhaps say that more definitely about. Dorothy Day, for instance, I'm not sure would want official sainthood and especially not one requiring miracles.

As a disabled person my main objection to Mother Teresa's canonisation is her ableism, in her theology and her work, particularly regarding pain relief. I object to her stance on contraception and so on but as others have said, that's part of being a conservative Catholic. However, ableism is not and the RCC has a strong history of supporting disabled people and their rights, and lots of disabled activism has a Catholic basis. On that basis I am disappointed in the canonisation of someone who represents all that is regressive and harmful when it comes to the care of disabled people. Don't Mother Teresa and her order's patients matter? Doesn't their treatment matter more than hers? Unfortunately they are ultimately just cogs in Mother Teresa's PR machine and don't seem to be of any importance to others.

If growing spiritually through pain is part of one's charism, that is fine. However to impose that on others, especially vulnerable people with no voice and no way of asking for help or protesting, that is utterly immoral and wrong.

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As regards the beauty in suffering narrative, I think it is a trope that has bean around for a long time. I see it, to a certain extent, as an older formulation of the idea of human dignity. Almost as if to say, OK so your are doubly incontinent, and you have a superating wound on your face, but you are still a valuble person.

Now we may routinely pay lip service to this, but this is not the case worldwide - and certainly wasn't in the 1950s. Many people have believed that disease and disfigurement reflect moral worth - also in some cultures - that your disability in this life is a result of your moral failure in a previous life.

Perhaps the expression of this in this particular way may now be antoquated, but to suggest as the Penn & Teller / Hitchens that it is somekind of fetish seems to me to wilfully misunderstand.

[ 20. December 2015, 14:22: Message edited by: Doublethink. ]

--------------------All political thinking for years past has been vitiated in the same way. People can foresee the future only when it coincides with their own wishes, and the most grossly obvious facts can be ignored when they are unwelcome. George OrwellPosts: 19219 | From: Erehwon | Registered: Aug 2005
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quote:Originally posted by Doublethink.:Yes, but then these weren't medical staff.

The problem with this line of argument is that they were there for long enough that they could pick up rudimentary medical knowledge if they were inclined (the whole thing about lack of sterilisation has been repeated many times by multiple people over multiple decades).

quote:why weren't you providing medical care to these people and referring them to a hospital if required ?

And there are documented cases of her refusing help from trained medical staff trying to do just that.

As regards the beauty in suffering narrative, I think it is a trope that has bean around for a long time. I see it, to a certain extent, as an older formulation of the idea of human dignity. Almost as if to say, OK so your are doubly incontinent, and you have a superating wound on your face, but you are still a valuble person.

Now we may routinely pay lip service to this, but this is not the case worldwide - and certainly wasn't in the 1950s. Many people have believed that disease and disfigurement reflect moral worth - also in some cultures - that your disability in this life is a result of your moral failure in a previous life.

Perhaps the expression of this in this particular way may now be antoquated, but to suggest as the Penn & Teller / Hitchens that it is somekind of fetish seems to me to wilfully misunderstand.

I'm certainly not coming from a Penn & Teller/Hitchens perspective. However, as well-intentioned as the 'beauty in suffering' narrative might be, it is still non-disabled people telling disabled people how they should feel about pain and disability. That's really not acceptable - it is for disabled people to direct the conversation on faith and pain and disability, because it is their lives it concerns. Denying people pain relief is not part of celebrating human dignity.

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Posted
Well they weren't refusing medical care in the Yemen, there just wasn't much available.

We are talking about a fourty year period of time across a hundred countries, so doubtless the picture is variable.

--------------------All political thinking for years past has been vitiated in the same way. People can foresee the future only when it coincides with their own wishes, and the most grossly obvious facts can be ignored when they are unwelcome. George OrwellPosts: 19219 | From: Erehwon | Registered: Aug 2005
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Posted
I'm not a Catholic; the RCC can do with her whatever it wants. But I'm not a big fan of her.

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Posted
Having one's name placed in the list of canonised saints does not mean (or at least within the Catholic understanding of what a Saint is) that one has led a blameless life. It does not mean that one has never made a mistake. It does mean that one has felt oneself touched by the love of Jesus Christ and that one has, before the end of this earthly life, tried one's best to respond to that love of Christ, particularly in the recognition of neighbour as the face of Christ.

Christianity and in particular Catholicism ,is a constant Act of Faith, Hope and Charity.Mother Theresa is well known in many parts of the world where the people have never heard of Malcolm Muggeridge.

From the outside, all religions have 'whacky' beliefs. How would most Christians attempt to explain the Trinity to a non Christian ?

How does one explain the 'miracles' of Jesus to a non-Christian ?

Those who criticise Mother Theresa must surely be ready and willing to do more than she attempted to do.

She would also be the first to declare herself to be a 'sinner'.
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Of course she had issues. She was a human being. We all have issues. It is part and parcel of being a human being.

That a human - with all of her faults and foibles - could be considered a saint is a reminder to all of us that we can serve God even as we are less than perfect.

Have you ever noticed the posse that followed Jesus came off more like a bunch of truly dim good old boys than living saints a lot of the time? They stand in for us; fallible humans trying to understand the personification of God and not getting it very well.

Maybe she is famous because of hype. Maybe Hitchens did a hatchet job. Maybe both. The Pope might be making a mistake. Gosh, the whole Catholic Church might fall asunder if he does.
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Of course she had issues. She was a human being. We all have issues. It is part and parcel of being a human being.

That a human - with all of her faults and foibles - could be considered a saint is a reminder to all of us that we can serve God even as we are less than perfect.

Have you ever noticed the posse that followed Jesus came off more like a bunch of truly dim good old boys than living saints a lot of the time? They stand in for us; fallible humans trying to understand the personification of God and not getting it very well.

Maybe she is famous because of hype. Maybe Hitchens did a hatchet job. Maybe both. The Pope might be making a mistake. Gosh, the whole Catholic Church might fall asunder if he does.

Calling out wrongdoing is surely a Christian duty - especially so regarding someone who has been granted a great honour, albeit posthumously. Institutional ableism and medical neglect is rather more than 'having some faults'. She harmed people and has been rewarded for that. That is not part and parcel of being a human being, that is serious wrongdoing.

I don't expect Mother Teresa to have been perfect, I do expect the RCC not to canonise people who actively strove against dignity and worthwhile lives for disabled people.

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quote:Originally posted by Forthview: Having one's name placed in the list of canonised saints does not mean (or at least within the Catholic understanding of what a Saint is) that one has led a blameless life. It does not mean that one has never made a mistake. It does mean that one has felt oneself touched by the love of Jesus Christ and that one has, before the end of this earthly life, tried one's best to respond to that love of Christ, particularly in the recognition of neighbour as the face of Christ.

Christianity and in particular Catholicism ,is a constant Act of Faith, Hope and Charity.Mother Theresa is well known in many parts of the world where the people have never heard of Malcolm Muggeridge.

From the outside, all religions have 'whacky' beliefs. How would most Christians attempt to explain the Trinity to a non Christian ?

How does one explain the 'miracles' of Jesus to a non-Christian ?

Those who criticise Mother Theresa must surely be ready and willing to do more than she attempted to do.

She would also be the first to declare herself to be a 'sinner'.

Dismissing the threat of contaminated needles since AIDS 'doesn't exist' is rather more than 'a mistake'. Why don't the people who died in Mother Teresa's care matter? Her readiness to declare herself a sinner is immaterial - an admission of guilt does not make wrongdoing not exist. She harmed people. She may have had good intentions initially - but good intentions do not absolve guilt. As a disabled person I feel that criticising Mother Teresa is part of criticism of ableism in the Church generally - something which actively harms myself and other disabled people. Why is that not a valid basis for criticism?

--------------------Consider the work of God: Who is able to straighten what he has bent? [Ecclesiastes 7:13]Posts: 5319 | From: UK | Registered: Jun 2012
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quote:Originally posted by Forthview:From the outside, all religions have 'whacky' beliefs. How would most Christians attempt to explain the Trinity to a non Christian ?

How does one explain the 'miracles' of Jesus to a non-Christian ?

I think there are plenty of examples of good attempts to explain the Trinity and to interpret the New Testament stories about Jesus, using reasonable arguments that try to connect with the common understanding around us. That is to say, using sound logic, understanding secular morality, having regard to acceptable forms of evidence and so on. A defence of the faith to its 'cultured despisers' to use an old phrase.

But Catholic saint creation flies on the face of reason and evidence, and relies on and seems designed to appeal to credulous anecdote and populist over-enthusiasm. It's not 'serious' in all the good senses of that word. It's more Eurovision Song Contest or BBC Sports Personality of the Year, than UCL research laboratory or peer-reviewed journal.

And that's fine if that's what they want to do, but I would have hoped the RCs would have higher aspirations.

You would probably not be surprised that I don't accept that evaluation.

I will admit that this thread isn't a subject I know much about or thought much about, yet alone researched. However, do these accusations against Mother Theresa trace back to Christopher Hitchens's polemics, directly or at second hand, or is there other evidence for them which is both unconnected to that source and objective?

But there has never been any systematic investigation as far as I am aware.

[ 20. December 2015, 21:54: Message edited by: Doublethink. ]

--------------------All political thinking for years past has been vitiated in the same way. People can foresee the future only when it coincides with their own wishes, and the most grossly obvious facts can be ignored when they are unwelcome. George OrwellPosts: 19219 | From: Erehwon | Registered: Aug 2005
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quote:Originally posted by Forthview:Mother Theresa is well known in many parts of the world where the people have never heard of Malcolm Muggeridge.

Those who criticise Mother Theresa must surely be ready and willing to do more than she attempted to do.

I was serious in my reference to both Malcolm Muggeridge and Princess Diana. To bring anyone back to the faith which they had lost - and very publicly decried in the case of Muggeridge in the 50s and 60s - strikes me as an excellent work. I'd be surprised if there were not more people, inspired by her example, who re-examined their own lives and found their way to faith.

quote:Originally posted by Enoch: Is part of the dilemma, that even in the developed world, and still in the less developed parts of the world, pain relief has hardly been available?

Yes, it's good to be able to relieve it if one can. And if so, it is good to give thanks for that. But if one can't isn't it better to have a set of beliefs that makes life liveable in spite of it?

But pain relief was available - she just prevented its use.

Citation ?

These allegations tend to be made in generalities.

FWIW in the late eighties my mother arranged funding for one of the children they cared for Sana'a, via an international women's charity, to go to Saudi for a corneal transplant. Ali was about five and had downs syndrome, his eyes didn't close therefore his corneas were scarred and impairing his vision.

This required medical assessment and intervention, there was never a problem with the sisters allowing this to happen. About a year later there was a cholera edpidemic, it swept through the home and a number of the people there died - Ali survived but, weakened as he was, he succumbed to pneumonia not long afterward. The reason they didn't all die of cholera was that medical care was accessed.

Maybe the order sometimes made crap descisions, I only had contact with one mission. But it certainly wasn't universally true that that medical care wasn't accessed.

[ 20. December 2015, 22:04: Message edited by: Doublethink. ]

--------------------All political thinking for years past has been vitiated in the same way. People can foresee the future only when it coincides with their own wishes, and the most grossly obvious facts can be ignored when they are unwelcome. George OrwellPosts: 19219 | From: Erehwon | Registered: Aug 2005
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Dismissing the threat of contaminated needles since AIDS 'doesn't exist' is rather more than 'a mistake'. Why don't the people who died in Mother Teresa's care matter? Her readiness to declare herself a sinner is immaterial - an admission of guilt does not make wrongdoing not exist. She harmed people. She may have had good intentions initially - but good intentions do not absolve guilt. As a disabled person I feel that criticising Mother Teresa is part of criticism of ableism in the Church generally - something which actively harms myself and other disabled people. Why is that not a valid basis for criticism?

I don't know what "ableism" is or what it is supposed to mean. I suspect that it's one of those sociology terms used to castigate those with whom the writer disagrees.

Of course people died in Mother Teresa's care. Her work was amongst those dying, to whom charity and compassion was shown in their last days. It's like saying that lots of people die in the nursing home nearby. And remember also that the Calcutta slums even these days do not contain the medical facilities available in the modern hospital a couple of kms from my home. The position in Calcutta in the late 40s would have been appalling.

Of course there are problems with the use of contaminated needles, but what do you do if you need to give injections to 30 or 300 people and have only a half dozen needles, if that? BTW, I doubt that AIDS would have been much of a problem until the early 80s at least.

Posted
When I was in chemotherapy treatment a Commmunity of nuns offered to pray a novena for me. I was touched (who would not be?)

I told a friend who, being from another country, had looked up the Order's website and replied to my mail about the Novena with a terse "They want you for their miracle!" I knew the Mother who founded the Order was in a beatification process (in the dim dark corridors of The Vatican). It was kinda weird.

Obviously, I am still alive but at the time I had "tons" of Really Clever People praying for me. How would they have been able to ascrible my survival as HER miracle.

It was indeed a miracle but...

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Posted
As usual all things are true. She was obviously a saint and we are in her crippled company. Grains of wheat in the blizzard of chaff since her death don't make her so. Her being a struggling, weak, ignorant Christian made her so.

quote:Originally posted by Pomona:However, as well-intentioned as the 'beauty in suffering' narrative might be, it is still non-disabled people telling disabled people how they should feel about pain and disability. That's really not acceptable - it is for disabled people to direct the conversation on faith and pain and disability, because it is their lives it concerns. Denying people pain relief is not part of celebrating human dignity.

Yes. I think any theology of suffering starts with the challenge to help the sufferer, not to explain away the suffering.

I'm pretty clear that Mother Teresa and those who worked with her in her calling helped some sufferers and not others. To be called to "the poorest of the poor" is very difficult in practice. Some measures of rationing, and therefore discriminating, seem inevitable. In practice, there is not enough love to go around. Not in this life.

But from the comfort of my armchair I'm not going to point the finger at the imperfections, struggles and doubts of someone who in her lifetime provided a good deal more help to the poorest of the poor than I did. The real question I'd like to have asked Christopher Hitchens is "what did you ever do to help the poorest of the poor?". For all I know, maybe he had a good record in this area. But sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander.

Seriously, I'm not sure it is the business of any of us to point-score the balance sheet between saintly and sinful behaviour in anyone else. I don't think the Catholic church should do that any more than I think Christopher Hitchens should. Or me. We are all such a confused and confusing mixture of saint and sinner.

So such final judgments seem to me to rest with God, rather than the imperfect assessments of historians or moralists. No harm in being clear-eyed about what we can learn from the lives of others, but that's rather different from censorious and self-righteous finger-pointing.

--------------------Who is it that you seek? How then shall we live? How shall we sing the Lord's song in a strange land?Posts: 21397 | From: Norfolk UK | Registered: Feb 2005
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Posted
What we can see from Mother Theresa's life is thatshe attempted to show compassion to others whose lives were more difficult than hers.Her compassion was animated by her relationship with Jesus Christ and love of God.As such the Catholic Church is able to present her to the faithful as a person who has inspired others to lead better lives.

In mentioning that she is better known than Malcolm Muggeridge I meant no disrespect to the gentleman. Whatever some people think of him , Christians should surely rejoice that he (and his wife) either came into or came back to the Christian community following their meetings with Mother Theresa.

We are all in this life in some way disabled. Some people are intellectually challenged, some people are physically challenged, some people are challenged by age, too young to know, too old to care. Yes,it sometimes sounds condescending ,even when some Christians remind others that they are sinners and in need of God's mercy. 'Ableness' is also for me a new word, but whenever we are able, we should try as far as possible to do something out of love for others to make for others their experience of life better than it would be otherwise.

Posted
I think the key issue for many critics, like Hitchens, is they perceive her to have done more harm than good.

I think they're wrong - but I do accept those criticisms arise out of sincere concern.

[ 21. December 2015, 09:53: Message edited by: Doublethink. ]

--------------------All political thinking for years past has been vitiated in the same way. People can foresee the future only when it coincides with their own wishes, and the most grossly obvious facts can be ignored when they are unwelcome. George OrwellPosts: 19219 | From: Erehwon | Registered: Aug 2005
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quote:Doublethink.: I think the key issue for many critics, like Hitchens, is they perceive her to have done more harm than good.

This is my opinion also. Whatever people think of her as a flawed human being is up to them. But when it comes to working with the poor, hers is an example to be avoided. She basically taught the poor to hold up their hands as beggars, and shut up. And I do think there was a lot of ego involved in being the person who put something in those hands. Of course, this can never be fully avoided: there is always going to be an imbalance between donor and recipient. But instead of trying to do something to address this imbalance, she relished in it. Even in those days, it was clear already that this is not the way to go. When it comes to working with the poor, she is not a person who is missed.

--------------------I know why God made the rhinoceros, it's because He couldn't see the rhinoceros, so He made the rhinoceros to be able to see it. (Clarice Lispector)Posts: 9474 | From: Brazil / Africa | Registered: Aug 2002
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--------------------All political thinking for years past has been vitiated in the same way. People can foresee the future only when it coincides with their own wishes, and the most grossly obvious facts can be ignored when they are unwelcome. George OrwellPosts: 19219 | From: Erehwon | Registered: Aug 2005
| IP: Logged